It’s back to the world of folklore and fantasy on this week’s Sunday Opera (3/26 3:00 p.m.) featuring a work by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov that has never been done at the Metropolitan Opera; it’s “The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevroniya.”
The libretto for this 1907 work is by Vladimir Belsky who looked to two folk legends for the story that combines the city of Kitezh which is said to have disappeared when it was attacked by Tatars. Fevroniya, who was to become St. Fevroniya, falls in love with a prince, is kidnapped and tormented by Tatars, and eventually finds her way into Kitezh which is tantamount to heaven where she is reunited with her love, Prince Vsevolod, and his father who had both been killed in battle.
The cast in this recording features Tatiana Monogarova as Fevroniya, Vitaly Panfilov as Prince Vsevolod, and Mikhail Kazakov as his father, Prince Yuiiy. Alexander Vedernikov is the conductor who leads the Chorus and Orchestra of the Teatro Lirico di Cagliari.
Directly after the opera, we’ll turn to some familiar music with Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Sheherazade” in a recording featuring the Toronto Symphony Orchestra with Peter Oundjian conducting.